[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 39 (Monday, March 18, 2013)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1873-S1874]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       THE CONTINUING RESOLUTION

  Mr. REID. Madam President, I want to advise everyone as to what is 
happening with our effort to keep the government running. On Thursday 
we recessed for the weekend so negotiators could attempt to reach an 
agreement on a finite list of amendments to consider today. The bill 
managers, Senators Shelby and Mikulski, have worked very hard, and they 
have made progress over the weekend. They have condensed the number of 
amendments that are being seriously talked about. I commend them and 
their staff for all their efforts. I have spoken to both of them this 
morning; they have not yet reached an agreement. I think they are 
getting close--or at least I hope that is the case. Just before coming 
in here, I spoke to one of the staff members, and he is reaching out to 
Senator Shelby's staff before presenting it to the two Senators for 
their approval.
  Frankly, I had trouble getting both sides to agree on a finite list 
of amendments. There were a lot of amendments that people wanted, but 
he objected to this and she objected to that. There is still hope that 
we can have a limited number of amendments and vote on those so we can 
move to final passage of the bill. One way or another, we have to move 
forward on this bill.
  On Wednesday I filed a motion to invoke cloture on the pending 
substitute amendment and the underlying bill. On Thursday we postponed 
that cloture vote, anticipating that an agreement would be reached and 
that we could consider amendments today. Absent an agreement, we will 
vote on a cloture petition tonight. It is in the interest of all 
Senators that we move forward with this important legislation. The 
House is waiting on our action. There is a great deal of work to do on 
either side of the aisle before March 27 kicks in.
  Also, the more time we spend on this continuing resolution, the less 
time we will have to vote on amendments to

[[Page S1874]]

the budget resolution. As a reminder, the budget resolution cannot be 
filibustered, but there is 50 hours of debate allowed. We must reserve 
time this week to consider a number of amendments on the budget. After 
all 50 hours expires, there will be unlimited amendments. So this is 
going to be a very full week. Senators should expect to work into the 
night as well as some late votes.
  We will stay as long as it takes to complete work on both the 
continuing resolution and the budget resolution even if that means 
working on the weekend and into the Easter and Passover recess. I 
understand that Passover is on Monday, so if we don't finish over the 
weekend, we would have to come back after Passover, which would be 
terribly unfortunate, but we need some cooperation from Senators on 
both sides of the aisle. I am hopeful and confident we can get there.

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